Thursday, January 24, 2013

Henry ... new work-in-progress

Henry • WORK-IN-PROGRESS

Today I started on this commissioned portrait of Henry, a little teddy bear of a dog who had me smiling all the while I was working on him this afternoon. I wasn’t the only one painting Henry today; Kimberly Santini put it perfectly on her blog when she said that Henry’s Grandma couldn’t decide between us, so she invited both of us to paint Henry! We’re both delighted, because now we’re becoming friends and we might even be able to meet in person soon when she comes from Michigan down to Baton Rouge to teach a workshop. So cool.

Today I finished the acrylic underpainting, and tomorrow I will continue in oils. Remember, it’s perfectly fine to paint oils over acrylics, but not the other way around. Unless you’re the adventurous type who just wants to see what happens. Far be it from me to prevent experimentation! What could happen? I mean, I don’t think the universe would implode or anything if someone tried to paint with acrylics over oils; it just wouldn’t turn out like they expected, and it’s not generally recommended.

Hey, I just googled what happens if you paint with acrylics over oils?and got a lot of interesting information. If you’re like me, you might want to set a timer before you go wandering off, or you might just spend more time than you intended to in internet-land when there are other things you really need to be doing.

Here, I’ve started adding color glazes to the different areas, phthalo blue and quinacrodone fuschia Henry’s fur, Hooker’s green for the throw in the background, and burnt umber and fuchsia for the blanket in the foreground.

And here I’ve layered more color glazes in: burnt umber to deepen the green in the background throw (which will be mostly sort of burnt orange/red in the finished painting), some yellow-orange in the highlighted area on Henry’s head and ears, and that same yellow-orange and vermilion on the foreground blanket (which will be kind of turquoise blue and lavender in the finished painting). I had to laugh when I took these last two photos, because it looks kind of like he’s wearing a Raggedy Ann wig.

3 comments:

The painting looks great and I love watching your various stages as the painting comes to life! I'm Henry's grama and love her paintings and that of Kimberly Santini. I can't wait to receive both paintings! :))

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ABOUT ME

I’m an artist living in the farm country of north Louisiana, along with my husband, our four cats and five dogs.
I love to paint everything (including the walls in our house) and find constant inspiration in my daily life: dogs, cats, cows, horses, trees, fields, ponds and bayous, morning light, afternoon light ... you get the idea.
My work is greatly inspired by the style of America’s Golden Age of Illustration, particularly the work of Howard Pyle, N. C. Wyeth, Maxfield Parrish, Jessie Wilcox Smith, Elizabeth Shippen Green and others.
I’ve been painting my whole life, and I have sold my work to patrons all over the USA, Canada, the UK and Europe. As a follower of Christ, and with God’s help, my daily goal is to live every aspect of my life to the glory of God, from the most mundane and necessary of chores to the work I enjoy the best, ever grateful to be able to share whatever gifts I most graciously have been given.

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AN ARTIST’S JOURNAL where family, friends and mysterious strangers can see my paintings as they’re created, and where I’m liable to write on just about anything – the joy of creating art; life in the country; and, as a follower of Christ, aspiring to glorify God in all I do.

I’m happy to say that my art and technique has been included in this book by UK author/artist Gill Barron, the fairly famous Painter of Everything (she’s well on her way to painting everything in the entire world, and doing a beautiful job of it, too).

I have two step-by-step projects in the book, as well as several other finished paintings used as illustrations.